Tag Archives: jazz

Earl Scruggs, who played a major role in the development of bluegrass music, is shown here unveiling a historical marker in front of Ryman Auditorium in September 2006. (Photo: Dipti Vaidya / file / The Tennessean).

Welcome to Not Quite As Much Music City.

The International Bluegrass Music Association had its annual awards show last night at a sold-out Ryman Auditorium — the same stage on which bluegrass as we know it was born in late 1945 — and after a weekend of (highly recommended) “Fan Fest” concerts, the bluegrass folks will depart Nashville in favor of a three-year annual conference and awards show run in Raleigh, N.C.

Raleigh is a fine city, and in 1983 its North Carolina State University Wolfpack won an NCAA men’s basketball championship.

She’s spent decades on the stuff, working not on spotlit stages but in the sausage factory. Mostly in the publicity and booking sections of that factory, and publicity and booking are the most unpleasant forms of sausage.

She spent a year working for the sometimes great, always ego-clashing rock band Aerosmith, which is usually enough time to send Aerosmith’s own members into seclusion, rehab or (worse) “American Idol.”

She brought ultra-talented, little known blues and Americana acts to clubs in Boston in the 1980s, years after the blues had fallen from any kind of popular favor, and 15 years before anyone knew the term “Americana” had much to do with music. Easy gig, then.

She fell in love with a sax player and married him. There’s a recipe for security.

The laughable thing is what some folks told Barber when he started a record label called Jazz Music City. They said there’s not really enough jazz talent to have a record label in Nashville.

They were grossly in error. And Barber knows that, though he often chooses not to laugh at what is laughable. He works each day to refute the ill-informed notion of Nashville as anything less than a true Music City, where world-class musicians of all stripes collaborate onstage and in studios.

Jazz on the Cumberland will run every third Sunday from August through November at the amphitheater at Cumberland Park (592 S. 1st St.), and kicks off this Sunday, August 19 with a concert headlined by the the Roland Barber Quartet.

The Nashville Sunday Jazz Band performs Sunday evenings at Chappy’s on Church.

Nashville jazz musician Rahsaan Barber remembers spending time a few years ago in New York City, where he taught jazz courses to campers at the New York Summer Music Festival. While there, Barber talked about his hometown to a prominent trumpet player.

Almost every day of the week, you can find some strain of jazz — spanning several generations and countless subgenres — echoing out of one Nashville-area venue or another. It’s a scene that has only gotten stronger in the time since Barber talked to the doubting trumpeter.

“It’s the first time ever, in the 25 years that I’ve been here, that there’s something to do almost every night,” says Lori Mechem, executive director of the Nashville Jazz Workshop.

Aced our last quiz on this year's Grammy nominees, did you? Well, let's see how much you know about the awards themselves. What was the original name of the Grammys? How many albums did Shelby Lynne have to release to be named Best New Artist? What unbelievable record does Christopher Cross hold in Grammy history? Find the answers to those questions and more in our latest Grammy quiz.

Severinsen is filling in for composer/conductor Marvin Hamlisch who was forced to cancel his Schermerhorn shows this weekend due to illness. A release from Schermerhorn says Severinsen "so thoroughly enjoyed performing with the Nashville Symphony in 2009 that he quickly cleared his schedule to appear at Schermerhorn Symphony Center this weekend."

Best-known for his three-decade run with the Tonight Show, Severinsen joined the NBC Orchestra in 1962, became Music Director five years later and stayed with the program until host Johnny Carson retired in 1992.

Severinsen will perform Thursday February 2, at 7 p.m. and Friday-Saturday, February 3-4, at 8 p.m Resident Conductor Albert-George Schram will opening each evening with banjoist/vocalist Alison Brown, performing Americana selections. Tickets are available now at www.nashvillesymphony.org.

The jazz great last performed in Nashville at the Ryman Auditorium in 2010. That show was originally slated for the Schermerhorn, but was moved after the the venue endured serious damage in the Nashville flood.

Tickets for the concert go on sale to the general public at 10 a.m. Fri., Feb. 3.

Yo-Yo Ma performs at the Nashville Symphony's Season Opening Celebration on Sept. 9.

Wondering if the Nashville Symphony was continuing to think outside the box when it came to planning their 2011-12 season? Here’s a three-word answer: “Concerto for Banjo.”

That’s the name of a piece the symphony has commissioned Nashville banjo virtuoso Bela Fleck to compose and perform for the first time later this month, and it says a lot about the exciting season kicking off tonight at Schermerhorn Symphony Center.

In its first full year back at Schermerhorn since the concert hall was damaged in the 2010 Nashville flood, the symphony has cooked up a schedule that’s characteristically inspired and innovative, but with plenty of reverence for both classical tradition and Music City’s legacy. Nashville Symphony President and CEO Alan Valentine feels the season is one of their best to date.

“We think it really shows off not only the great artists in the hall and the orchestra, but it really demonstrates our commitment to American music in an interesting way.” Continue reading →

Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, the jazz-rock geniuses behind the inimitable Steely Dan, are in the midst of an ambitious tour they’re calling “Shuffle Diplomacy Twenty Eleven.” Different dates on the trek have the band covering one of three classic albums in their entirety or collections of their earliest and newest material. They will also devote shows to unreleased rarities and fan-voted tunes.

Nashville, however, will get a no-nonsense slab of Dan favorites, which will likely include the sophisticated funk of “Peg” and the harmony-laced rocker “Reelin’ in the Years,” among plenty of other unmistakable cuts.